Person: Colin Sheridan

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Person: Colin Sheridan

A COMPREHENSIVE SERIES OF ARTICLES ON THIS TOPIC

<p>Saying thank you — to staff serving us, or to a fellow commuter who lets us out in traffic — is a tiny investment of empathy and humility. <span class="contextmenu emphasis CaptionCredit">File Picture: Alamy</span>
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S columnists

Colin Sheridan: Saying please and thank you is common courtesy — but let’s draw the line at AI

Having been put in his place by his daughter (something all parents will recognise) Colin Sheridan figures we should err on the side of kindness and courtesy

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Colin Sheridan: Europe is rehearsing a war it may not be facing

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Colin Sheridan: We can imagine life on the Moon, but not dignity on Earth

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Colin Sheridan: Why actors’ round tables have become awards season’s strangest performance

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Colin Sheridan: New York loves an underdog story. So will Mamdani’s substance match the style?

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Colin Sheridan: Assata Shakur’s death recalls life’s living struggles

Colin Sheridan: Reaction to Charlie Kirk's killing shows our selective compassion

Colin Sheridan: Reaction to Charlie Kirk's killing shows our selective compassion

It is striking how one death prompts moral urgency from those who may have criticised many of the views of the man himself, while a daily reality of dozens killed and hundreds illegally detained is met with crickets

Sat, 13 Sep, 2025

Lebanon US

Colin Sheridan: US foreign policy arrogance in Lebanon is a warning sign for Ireland

A US envoy’s scolding of Lebanese journalists reveals a deeper truth: Ireland too risks humiliation if it remains overdependent on America

Sun, 31 Aug, 2025

Colin Sheridan: Irish language is back from the brink and shining on centre stage

Colin Sheridan: Irish language is back from the brink and shining on centre stage

Latin died because it behaved. Irish lives because it rebels

Sat, 23 Aug, 2025

voting candidate campaign in democracy ballot box. Latin mid hand unrecognizable man

Colin Sheridan: My presidency will be a masterclass in dignified inaction

With humility, humour and a peacekeeper’s patience, I’m ready to bring calm dignity — and better canapés — to the Áras

Sat, 16 Aug, 2025

Colin Sheridan: Stephen Colbert's axing brings to mind the lack of political satire here

Colin Sheridan: Stephen Colbert's axing brings to mind the lack of political satire here

The Late Show with Stephen Colbert saw its host deliver nightly shot glasses of satire and political punch‑drunk comedy. Our own Late Late Show is more cosy than cutting

Sat, 09 Aug, 2025

President Obama visit to Ireland - Day One

Colin Sheridan: Obama’s silence on Gaza makes Freedom of Dublin award deeply problematic

Dublin is honouring Obama amid a genocide he won’t speak out against — and that silence should matter more

Sun, 03 Aug, 2025

Youth soccer players practice on field. Stand in line, ready for training. Focus on black, white soccer ball. Scene shows sports

Colin Sheridan: The Sunday night parenting crisis you won’t see on Instagram

Faced with a forgotten summer camp booking and two overly prepared children, Colin Sheridan chooses panic — and then improv

Sat, 26 Jul, 2025

General Election 2017

S Colin Sheridan: Institutional racism wears a necktie

Diane Abbott has become Britain’s canary in a coal mine of racial hypocrisy. Colin Sheridan asks 'How many Diane Abbotts have we ignored in Ireland?

Sat, 19 Jul, 2025

Sotheby's Fashion Icons Auction

Colin Sheridan: Is a €8m handbag a sign that moral rot within society is beyond redemption?

We are in a golden age for absurdity — the global elite will throw millions at anything with a whiff of celebrity

Sat, 12 Jul, 2025

Immigration Protests Los Angeles

Colin Sheridan: We’ve all sat down by the hearth on someone else’s home turf

We don't need to look far to see the results of systemic bigotry

Sat, 14 Jun, 2025

Colin Sheridan: Is it time for men to step aside? Reimagining global leadership without testosterone

Colin Sheridan: Is it time for men to step aside? Reimagining global leadership without testosterone

With the world in chaos, one writer argues it’s time to ban men from power — and let women lead

Sat, 07 Jun, 2025

School exam stock

Colin Sheridan: Paradise lost? Today's teens miss out on beauty of yesterday's poetry

Soundings was dumped off the Leaving Cert curriculum in 2000, but was something lost in the move to make the syllabus more diverse and contemporary?

Sat, 31 May, 2025

The 54th Annual GRAMMY Awards - Press Room

Colin Sheridan: A process lies behind every perfection, it's why we jump through hoops

"For every flowering thought there will be a page like a wet and mangy mongrel, and for every looping flight a tap on the wing and a reminder that wax cannot hold the feathers firm too near the sun.

Sat, 24 May, 2025

78th Cannes Film Festival

Colin Sheridan: Tom Cruise’s insane journey from Oprah’s couch to cult worship at Cannes

His posture is designed to portray a certain humility, like he is not worthy of the praise given to him. He also wants you to know that he absolutely is

Sat, 17 May, 2025

Colin Sheridan: Facing up to my childhood fear of small islands

Colin Sheridan: Facing up to my childhood fear of small islands

After watching The Wicker Man, I developed a case of Insulaphobia

Fri, 09 May, 2025

Pope Francis death

Colin Sheridan: Learning to love missing out can protect your mental health in a Fomo-driven world

Learning to embrace Jomo — the joy of missing out — can help reclaim peace in a hyperconnected world

Sat, 26 Apr, 2025

Blue Origin - New Shepard NS-31 mission

Colin Sheridan: Katy Perry went to space — but this cosmonaut’s silence said more than words

An Irish peacekeeper discovers his silent Russian patrol partner was once a cosmonaut — after weeks of silence

Sat, 19 Apr, 2025

Colin Sheridan: The White Lotus season 3 is over — and it might be time we check out of prestige TV too

Colin Sheridan: The White Lotus season 3 is over — and it might be time we check out of prestige TV too

The White Lotus promised escapism — but its finale left me longing for hope, Galway summers, and some actual joy

Sat, 12 Apr, 2025

Bike in traffic, winter

Colin Sheridan: Why extending the hand of friendship can be a tall order

An overthought coffee meet-up ends in awkward hugs, literary quotes, and the quiet heartbreak of adult friendship

Sat, 05 Apr, 2025

How one woman is rescuing migrant workers trapped in Lebanon’s abusive kafala system

S How one woman is rescuing migrant workers trapped in Lebanon’s abusive kafala system

Lebanon’s kafala system traps migrant workers in abuse and exploitation — one woman is risking everything to change that

Sat, 29 Mar, 2025

Colin Sheridan: How a Harlem-born intellectual influenced a generation in Ireland through television

Colin Sheridan: How a Harlem-born intellectual influenced a generation in Ireland through television

Alvin Poussaint’s work on race, mental health, and media shaped perceptions far beyond America—including in Ireland

Sat, 22 Mar, 2025

Taoiseach visit to the US

Colin Sheridan: Trump's 'honesty' is immediately cancelled out by his deviousness

Has the US President's hot-mic approach rendered the nuances of mutual respect between statesmen obsolete?

Sat, 15 Mar, 2025

Nickelodeon's 2023 Kids' Choice Awards - Show

Colin Sheridan: Who is MrBeast? The YouTube mogul captivating, and profiting from, your kids

MrBeast dominates YouTube with over-the-top giveaways and stunts, raising questions about his influence on kids and digital culture

Sat, 01 Mar, 2025

Colin Sheridan: We need a national tree strategy

Colin Sheridan: We need a national tree strategy

European countries boast an average 35% forest cover yet Ireland stands at a disgraceful 11%; much of our country is as barren as the Sierra Nevada

Sat, 08 Feb, 2025

Taoiseach visits President Michael D Higgins

Colin Sheridan: Michael D Higgins' record as an advocate for human rights is unimpeachable

President has the courage and intellect to articulate carefully chosen sentiments of empathy and concern for events both past and present

Sun, 02 Feb, 2025

Taoiseach visit to Naas

S Colin Sheridan: Political leaders must reclaim high ground in a moral vacuum

Muddying the waters to make them seem deep — this seems to be what a lot of Irish politics is about right now

Sat, 18 Jan, 2025

Elon Musk

Colin Sheridan: Donald Trump’s ego our only hope that Musk won't do more damage

Since dumping at least $250m into Donald Trump’s campaign, Musk has become arm candy for the president-elect, who is set to be inaugurated next week, writes Colin Sheridan

Sat, 11 Jan, 2025

Colin Sheridan: Woke? Try seeing the world from a child’s view

S Colin Sheridan: Woke? Try seeing the world from a child’s view

There’s an argument that official Ireland — our governments and legislature — has decided we will be the First Woke Nation

Sat, 04 Jan, 2025

Technology Stock

Colin Sheridan: In pursuit of progress, not perfection

I reckon we all spend these few days of pensive purgatory doing the same thing. Reflecting. Ruminating. Reorganising our minds

Sat, 28 Dec, 2024

Colin Sheridan: A homecoming like no other for Syrians

Colin Sheridan: A homecoming like no other for Syrians

The memory of a poignant Christmas ad has resonated even more this year

Sat, 21 Dec, 2024

Colin Sheridan: Harris, Day-Lewis, Farrell? Make way for Mescal's moment

Colin Sheridan: Harris, Day-Lewis, Farrell? Make way for Mescal's moment

What distinguishes Paul Mescal from all the other great Irish actors?

Fri, 13 Dec, 2024

Ai technology, Artificial Intelligence. Let artificial intelligence help create what you want, Future technology concept.

Colin Sheridan: AI is a crutch that our kids don't need

Colin Sheridan reacts to the news this week that Leaving Cert students will be able to use artificial intelligence tools when preparing research projects from next year

Sat, 07 Dec, 2024

‘My Message to the next Dail’ Podcast: Colin Sheridan on resolving the middle east crisis

‘My Message to the next Dail’ Podcast: Colin Sheridan on resolving the middle east crisis

In this episode Colin Sheridan – Irish Examiner writer and former member of the Irish Defence Forces - sets out what he feels needs to be done by the next government, whoever they may be, to help resolve the growing crisis in the middle east.

Listen | Sun, 24 Nov, 2024

Milken Institute's Global Conference Held In Beverly Hills

Colin Sheridan: I'm just not ready to abandon X — yet

Being active on X is not an endorsement of Elon Musk's ownership, but it still seems to reward his grotesque neo-capitalist megalomania. Even so, I’m just not ready to leave

Sat, 23 Nov, 2024

Strictly Come Dancing 2024

Colin Sheridan: TV rituals shouldn’t be forgotten

It felt good when my two children recently took it upon themselves to make an appointment with their granny to start watching 'Strictly Come Dancing' on a Saturday and Sunday night

Sat, 16 Nov, 2024

Colin Sheridan: A letter to all my friends who tell me to feel happy

Colin Sheridan: A letter to all my friends who tell me to feel happy

Writing about the genocide taking place in Palestine seems the most obvious thing in the world to do. That other people do not think so confounds and depresses me

Thu, 14 Nov, 2024

Colin Sheridan: Little sympathy for our reliance on the US dollar

Colin Sheridan: Little sympathy for our reliance on the US dollar

By virtue of our decades-long subservience, we have become utterly beholden to America

Sat, 09 Nov, 2024

Royal Tour of Australia and Samoa - Day Six

Colin Sheridan: Heavy the head that wears the crown

Monarchs, even disinterested ones, are prone to being told exactly what they want to hear

Sat, 26 Oct, 2024

Colin Sheridan: Inevitable slaughter follows every accusation made by Israel

Colin Sheridan: Inevitable slaughter follows every accusation made by Israel

Imagine a medic trying to access children under rubble, with no light or electricity to guide you? Israel bombs in the dead of night for that very reason

Wed, 23 Oct, 2024

Film - 'The Magic Box' - London

Colin Sheridan: Suddenly, from nowhere, a singer and a song cut through the despair

Broken by the horrors beamed onto my phone, that feeling was unexpectedly upended by a clip of Glynis Johns looking directly into camera and singing a song I knew but couldn't place...

Sat, 19 Oct, 2024

Benjamin Netanyahu

Colin Sheridan: Netanyahu's 'war' has killed tens of thousands. He'll hardly balk at a few peacekeepers

World leaders have not made Benjamin Netanyahu take even one step back in his quest for an ethnically-cleansed Palestine

Mon, 14 Oct, 2024

Colin Sheridan: Ireland's peacekeepers have a job to do in Lebanon. And do it they will

Colin Sheridan: Ireland's peacekeepers have a job to do in Lebanon. And do it they will

To understand why Ireland's contributions to the UN, and peacekeeping in Lebanon in particular, are so valuable, we must acknowledge our roles as outliers in the international community

Tue, 08 Oct, 2024

Conor McGregor file photo

S Colin Sheridan: Conor McGregor's Arsenal cameo shows toxic men get away with it

McGregor is vying with Andrew Tate for chairmanship of a club that swears allegiance to being an absolute eejit

Sun, 06 Oct, 2024

Colin Sheridan: Lip service won't save a single Palestinian life

S Colin Sheridan: Lip service won't save a single Palestinian life

Under the cover of self defence, Benjamin Netanyahu's IDF are effectively carrying out an ethnic cleansing of Palestinians. Yet we sit here and listen as he addresses the UN General Assembly

Sat, 28 Sep, 2024